Thursday, April 14, 2011

Collectable Dinosaur Minis Game

So, one thing I did not include in my write-up of our visit to the Burpee involved their museum store, since it's a side-note.

As I said, the gift shop turned out not to have more than a few general books, to my disappointment (if anybody does come across a good book on the discoveries in Niger, let me know). But I did pick up something called DINOMANIA, which is basically a little pack which you buy that has a random little dinosaur figure in it. Although, as is traditionally the case, they define 'dinosaur' rather loosely (this set even includes a brightly colored trilobite, wh. was actually the one I wanted).

This all took me back to the latter days at WotC/Hasbro. At one point when WotC announced a call for New Ideas for Games I tried in vain to convince somebody, anybody, that a collectable dinosaur minis game wd be a good idea. We were already doing gangbusters with the D&D minis line (wh. was actually doing far better than the rpg itself), which actually included dinosaurs among the monsters (for the Eberron setting). I argued that such a game would have an instant built-in market and the potential to reach new outlets, such as museum stores. And I completely failed to get anybody to express even the mildest interest.

Glad to see somebody else has succeeded, at least in the collectable dinosaur minis part (the person at the counter said they were v. popular with herself and her fellow employees at the museum store); suspect they'd have done even better w. a simple dino-to-dino combat game attached. Ah well; the good thing about missed opportunities is that sometimes someone else down the line takes advantage of them.